2.6.7 Killing and Yanking

The commands given below are used to copy areas of text and insert them at some other point in the buffer. Note that there is no corresponding "Cut and paste" section in the command references, so direct cross references have been included with each command.

When cutting and pasting, the first thing to do is to copy the region of text to be moved. This is done by taking the cursor to the beginning of the piece of text to be copied and pressing
Ctrl+Space
to set a mark, and then taking the cursor to the end of the text and pressing
Ctrl+W
. This kills the region between the current point and the mark but keeps a copy of the killed text. This copy can then be inserted anywhere in the buffer by putting the cursor at the required position and then pressing
Ctrl+Y
to insert the copied text.

If the original text is to be copied but not killed, use the command
Meta+W
instead of
Ctrl+W.
This copies the text ready for insertion, but does not delete it.